Section: South Africa Today (South Africa)

MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Ramil Sitdikov, a photo reporter of the Rossiya Segodnya International Information Agency who had been accredited for the Eurovision Song Contest was denied entry to Ukraine. “At the border they took his documents, went somewhere and in about an hour brought a decision to refuse entry,” Alexander Shtol, Director of the Joint...

BERLIN (Sputnik) — The German chancellor paid an official visit to Kiev in late January followed by a bilateral meeting with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko in late March in Malta, where Merkel stressed Ukraine’s importance for Europe. During the early April phone conversation between Merkel, Poroshenko, and French President Francois...

A German charity has responded to Kiev’s blockade of Donbass by sending a truck of hospital equipment there, Sputnik Deutschland reports. The charity is called “Zukunft Donbass” (Future Donbass) and is based in the state of Thuringia. The German activists have been supporting the people of Donbass for over a year and felt moved to send aid...

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The Ukrainian chief prosecutor’s office said Wednesday it would challenge a decision by Interpol to remove ousted President Viktor Yanukovych from its wanted list. The announcement was made hours after Yanukovych’s lawyer Yuri Kirasir published a letter by the international police organization confirming the end of...

BEIRUT (Sputnik) — Pupils of a boarding school for children of deceased Syrian soldiers will visit Russia and stay in Artek, an international children center in Crimea, at the invitation of the all-Russian organization of veterans “Boyevoye Bratstvo” (Military Brotherhood), Dmitry Sablin, the member of the lower house of Russia’s...

KIEV (Sputnik) — Kirasir published scans of an Interpol letter stating that a red notice, which is equivalent to an international arrest warrant, is absent against Yanukovych. “Interpol has thus confirmed the fact that criminal proceedings against Viktor Yanukovych [by Ukraine] are politically motivated,” the lawyer said on Facebook. The letter...

ODESSA (Ukraine) (Sputnik) — People came together for the remembrance rally on the Kulykove Pole square-garden near the Trade Unions House, located in the historical part of the city. The rally goers said that organizers of the event had been detained by the Security Service of Ukraine. During the rally, the attendees read poems in honor of the...

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — Press freedom is under attack in Ukraine, with government officials pressing journalists to only write stories that portray the country in a positive light and approving acts of intimidation against reporters who deviate from official narratives, the US human rights group Freedom House said on Monday. “While ongoing reforms...

As it turned out, the organizers had started selling tickets even before the venue of this month’s event was ready. The builders made changes to its overall layout and, as a result, some of the seats ended up too far from the stage and some simply disappeared without trace. The unlucky buyers were offered to choose between exchanging their...

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Seven Ukrainian citizens have been detained by the UK border force over suspicion of illegal border crossing, local media reported. According to the Ipswich Star newspaper, seven suspected illegal immigrants from Ukraine were detained after their sailing yacht ran aground on the banks of the River Ore in Suffolk County. “Border...